If you love infill, why complain about it?

Yes, well that's what infill looks like, pal. Remember when you commented that you "live in a city and appreciate the value of density"? (Sorry, but this sounds like something a transplant would say.) "Oh, the suburbs are so boring!" Well, Astoria is part of a city and the borough it is situated in hasn't been considered suburban for about a century. Most parts of Queens used to be quite lovely and, if you look back at my nostalgia-tinged posts about past places of enjoyment, not boring. Of course, this was mainly before infill. These days, if you don't visit a spot for awhile, you end up not recognizing it when you return. Large public gathering places are replaced with the sort of "cram in as many as we can" structures pictured. Hell, they are even selling off pieces of Queens' signature park for development.

A variety of architecture that strikes the right balance is desirable. Nice big houses on large lots with lots of trees, apartment buildings with courtyards, rowhouses - they all have their place. Blocks containing walls of blond-brick Fedders nightmares replacing architecture containing life-affirming features, I can do without. An 8-story building sticking up like a middle finger where there previously was a one-family house, I can do without. And I think most people feel that way.

11 comments:

Anonymous
said...

Amen, Crapper. Couldn't have said it better myself.

There are places worth fighting for, and we've done it. The problem in places like Astoria is that between the tower people and the hipster doofuses and know-it-alls and criminal developers...well, you get the picture.

Astoria Ugly's response last time, trying to quote Jane Jacobs as a defense for his blindly pro-density views, made my blood boil.

"the great blight of dullness" he so smugly quotes is NOT JUST ABOUT SUBURBS. Only a phony would read it that way. it is about long blocks of bland, overdeveloped overly dense garbage. it's a direct challenge to Fedders infill crap. Fighting the great blight of dullness does not simply mean greater density, it means protecting local character and respecting what was there before. If we have to reference Jane Jacobs (so fucking pretentious) Astoria ALREADY satisfied her criteria for a good city. Short blocks, walkable, low buildings, mixed use, low crime. Buying into BS pro-density propaganda only serves the interests of the developers strangling the life out of the city.

Astoria was a great neighborhood for decades before Astoria Ugly showed up there. I'm sympathetic to the young people (hipsters, if you will) that see value in bike lanes and pro-density policies but they need to learn to respect the neighborhood that was there before. Making it safer to bike is one thing but if you "love" the neighborhood so much, why do you want it to change?

One day, hopefully, he'll learn that even the most sensible or well-intentioned liberal ideals can be hijacked by greedy developers and politicians. Until then, I just wish he'd STFU.

Alas, but true. And another bigger problem is that most units constructed are probably more of the one bedroom or studio type apartments as opposed to two or three bedrooms.

Should that be the case, let’s say then that in 10 -20 years…What is to happen to Astoria when the young professionals mature and develop families and will need to move on to larger apartments? And if the young single professionals find another trendier spot in NYC to habitate? If there is no retaining power built in to the models, and no new tenants to backfill the vacant apartments left behind, Astoria could turn into a ghost town or go back to the past when a vast amount of apartments were filled by Section 8 residents.

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